The present invention broadly relates to a new and improved construction of a conveying device.
In its more particular aspects, the present invention specifically relates to a new and improved construction of a conveying device containing at least one guide channel and an endless chain guided within the guide channel for the entrainment of objects or articles to be conveyed from a first station to a second station.
Such conveying device is especially suitable for conveying printed products, such as, for example, newspapers produced by a rotary printing process. In such applications, it is frequently required to couple one of the stations, which can be either a supply or dispatching station or a receiving station, selectively to more than one conveying device, or, alternatively, to couple a conveying device selectively to more than one such station. Since no switches or turnouts can be used with an endless chain, it has heretofore been usual, for example, in the case of two adjacently extending guide channels, to shift or displace the station between the two guide channels when the printed products, for example, should be delivered alternatingly from various supply or dispatching stations to a single receiving station. The receiving station, for example, may constitute a device of the type described in Swiss Pat. No. 623,794, granted June 30, 1981, and the cognate British Patent No. 1,568,752, directed to a device for stacking folded printed products which continuously arrive in an imbricated formation.
The endless chain used for a conveying device of the previously mentioned type is preferably a universal-joint link chain provided with travelling wheels. The universal-joint link chain is guided in a guide channel having a downwardly open substantially C-shaped cross-section. Such a chain is described, for example, in Swiss Pat. No. 588,647, granted Apr. 15, 1977, and cognate with U.S. Pat. No. 4,294,345, granted Oct. 13, 1981.